Ebionites

The Ebionites were a sect of early Christianity which believed that Jesus was the Messiah, but was neither divine nor of virgin birth. The sect considered themselves to be Jewish followers of Jesus and observed Jewish laws (including kashrut and circumcision); they emerged after the Council of Jerusalem in 50 AD. The Ebionites believed that Jesus was the adoptive son of God, that he followed Jewish laws perfectly, that his sacrificial death on the cross satisfied God's punishment of death on all sons of Adam, and that the temple sacrifice of animals (made obsolete by Jesus' death) included the slaughter of animals, leading to them adopting vegetarian diets. The Ebionites did not accept Paul the Apostle or any of his writings, and they believed in the Gospel of Matthew from chapter three onwards, only believing in parts of the New Testament. They also had an additional gospel which had quotes from Jesus condemning the consumption of meat, and they believed that John the Baptist and James were also vegetarians. The sect did not achieve much popularity, but their theology inspired the growth of Islam, as their presence in Hejaz led to Muhammad discovering the Abrahamic faiths.